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This observation doesn't eliminate the possibility that the Lone Pine Gulch and Edwards Portal <br />spring water is fault water having undergone carbon-13 depletion between November 1996 <br />(when B East Mains Fault water was first Bumped in the NW panel sump) until the samples from <br />Lone Pine Gulch and Edwards Portal were taken in December 1997. One possible mechanism is <br />the simple dissolution of methane (CHq) during the time spent in the NW panel sump. No S"C <br />values are available for either the Beaz or the West Elk mines, but coal itself typically displays a <br />"C signature typical of estuazine sediments (azound -25 per mil), with the associated methane <br />typically depleted even more in the heavier isotope carbon-13. <br />It is not unreasonable to predict that water with S"C values around that of ocean water (0), such <br />as the fault waters at West Elk, would show light carbon isotope numbers (low S"C) afrer <br />interacting with coal and coal-bed methane for a year. It must be pointed out, however, for <br />complete honesty, that the value of S"C presented for an analyzed sample of water directly from <br />the B-seam itself is highly positive (+24). This is another piece of evidence which seems <br />incongruous. <br />Other Stable Isotopic Evidence <br />